Toowoomba girl Molly Wagner to help beat poverty through education

Event Brief

When Molly Wagner visited The School of St Jude in Tanzania two years ago she was so impressed by the gratitude and efforts from students her own age for the opportunity to learn.

Now a few years on and in her role as St Ursula’s College School Captain the 17 year old felt it was time to build on her earlier experience at St Jude’s and help the beautiful people of Tanzania beat poverty through education.

Miss Wagner and Jo Capp from The Event Group Toowoomba recently hosted an evening for guests to hear about not only Miss Wagner’s experience but also meet and listen to the founder Gemma Sisia and St Jude’s student Dorice at the Toowoomba Grammar Junior School Auditorium.

Money raised for the Beyond St Jude's program provides students with the opportunity to go onto a university so they can study, but in return they make a pledge to the community that they will return to Tanzania to help build their community. As a result they will have their own people return as qualified engineers, doctors, nurses and many other specialist areas to help look after the community.

Since 2002 when the School of St Jude first opened they have added 150 students every year with the first senior class graduating last year in 2015.

Poverty is unrelenting in Tanzania and St Jude’s provides a free, high quality education to children who – due to poverty and social pressures – would otherwise be unlikely to complete their schooling. Due to resources, the number of students is limited to 150 every year entering St Jude’s.

The students chosen were from families who often live on less than $1.25 per day. They go through a rigorous selection process before being granted the opportunity of attending to St Jude’s and successful students are chosen because they combined academic promise with a desperately poor background and a great attitude to work.

With generous and ongoing support individuals and institutions around the world St Jude’s has built an exceptional education institution that regularly ranks in the top 10% nationally.

While at school they are fed, housed and educated to ensure every students’ wellbeing and future success. As a result The School of St Jude’s has three campuses filled with happy and healthy children in a country where children frequently drop out of school.